


A Say About It

by allisondraste



Series: Minutemen Missives [1]
Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 4
Genre: Drabble, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-09
Updated: 2020-04-09
Packaged: 2021-03-01 22:40:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,419
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23554684
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/allisondraste/pseuds/allisondraste
Summary: Preston and Charlie have a heart-to-heart about their feelings and her late husband.
Relationships: Preston Garvey/Female Sole Survivor, Preston Garvey/Sole Survivor
Series: Minutemen Missives [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1716052
Comments: 12
Kudos: 17





	A Say About It

**Author's Note:**

> Did I ever expect to be writing Fallout 4 fanfic? Nah. But alas, here we are. Let me know whatcha think!

He wasn’t Nate. She knew that. In fact, that knowledge filled every fiber of her being and sounded alarm bells in her brain each time her heart so much as fluttered when their eyes met. Or when he laughed at her ridiculous jokes. Or when they bumped shoulders and he apologized profusely even though it had absolutely been her fault. 

He wasn’t Nate, and he knew that too. It’s why he often opened his mouth to say something, but frowned and stayed silent instead. It pooled behind his eyes and washed worry across his face. It was impossible to compete with a dead man’s memory, and she wished he didn’t have to. 

A cold wind swept across the camp, snapping Charlie abruptly from her thoughts, shuddering the length of her spine. The entire world had changed in the two-hundred-some-odd years she’d been a popsicle, and yet Massachusetts winters were still completely unbearable. She wrapped her arms around herself and scooted closer to the fire they’d built to chase the chill away. Beside her, Preston chuckled.

“Cold, General?”

“How could you tell,” she quipped through chattering teeth, offering him what smile she could muster. He laughed again and she continued. “You know, you’d think after being in a cryogenic chamber for so long, I’d be used to it.”

“I don’t know,” Preston said, with a sigh, eyes fixed on the flames, “If I were you, if that happened to me... I don’t know. I think I probably wouldn’t ever want to be cold again.”

Charlie pressed her lips together, struggling to maintain the fragile grasp she had on her composure. She wanted to say something, anything to acknowledge his empathy, but words failed her, phantom numbness gnawing at her nose and fingertips. The silence stretched between them for a while, heavy but not uncomfortable, before she finally willed herself to speak.

“It’s not the cold that bothers me,” she explained and he snapped his head in her direction. Relief that she broke the silence evident on his face. “I mean— don’t get me wrong, I’d rather be on some mystical unirradiated beach somewhere, basking in sunlight that isn’t filtered in past noxious green fumes.”

“Damn. That does sound nice.”

“Doesn’t it?” She laughed, stretching her hands out toward the fire. She didn’t want to tell him that she and Nate had been planning a vacation before the bombs fell, that they were going to leave Shaun with her parents and go somewhere nice, just the two of them. But that’s all she could think about. “Do Minutemen ever get vacations?” 

“No one gets a vacation in the Commonwealth,” he said, raising his eyebrows, “Kinda hard to relax.”

“Seriously? Huh. I, for one, find having ferals fling themselves through windows at me very relaxing,” she joked, guilty that she even brought it up. Another icy gust of wind pierced through the fire’s warmth, past every layer Charlie wore, and she hissed. “Christ!”

Preston chuckled again and rose to his feet, and headed toward the edge of camp without a word, nearly disappearing outside the campfire’s radius. 

“Whatcha doin’,” she called after him.

He didn’t respond, but returned with something in his arms. It looked to be a heavy blanket of some sort. Fleece, maybe? Where had he gotten it?

“I picked this up at the last settlement we visited,” he explained, as if he read her mind, and unfolded it. “This time of year, sometimes a coat’s not enough.”

“Look at you with all of that planning and forethought,” Charlie teased. “I’m glad one of us has some sense.”

“I do my best,” he said, holding the blanket out toward her. “May I?”

She nodded, and he moved to drape the blanket around her shoulders before sitting back down beside her. She grabbed its edges and pulled it more snugly around her before flicking her eyes to him.

“Better,” he asked. 

“Much. Thank you, Preston.”

Silence stretched between them, not uncomfortable, but heavy with unsaid truths. They weren’t just friends. There was more there, a spark that could be a flame if given the proper kindling. Charlie wasn’t sure she was ready for a fire, and she definitely wouldn’t have known where to start if she was. Nate had been her first and only everything, and she’d never considered that he might not be her always. 

“Hey, Charlie,” Preston asked, breaking the silence and his usual formality.

“Yeah?” 

“You never said what actually bothered you about the cryo chamber situation,” he said, fidgeting with his gloves, “I understand if you don’t want to talk about it, but...well, I’m here if you do.”

“I hated the cold, I hated the claustrophobia, I hated all of it,” she explained, eyes burning, “But being entirely alone and unable to do anything about it? I’d rather die than live through that again.”

A single tear rolled down her face with all the gravity of admitting that she was not the shining example of resilience and perseverance that he believed her to be. He’d wanted to die after Quincy, before she had shown up in Concord and somehow saved the day. He told her that much. What would he think of his daring General now?

A gentle hand fell on her shoulder, and she glanced over to Preston, who smiled back warmly. 

“You won’t ever feel that way again,” he said earnestly, “Not if I have anything to say about it.”

Charlie frowned, even as his words brought warmth rising to her cheeks. She knew he meant what he said, she knew he believed that he could promise that to her, but she also knew he couldn’t. Not really. Nothing was ever so certain. 

“My husband always promised me that same thing,” she remarked, more sharply than she would have liked, and twisted the silver band she still wore on her finger, “Sometimes you just don’t get to have a say about it. Sometimes you’re entirely helpless.”

“I’m sorry,” he said, lifting his hand from her shoulder and resting it on the ground between them. 

“You don’t have to apologize. It was a kind thing to say,” she reassured him, “It just reminded me of him, and how much it hurt to lose him... and how much it would hurt to lose you, too.”

“Oh,” he muttered looking down at the ground and then back up to her. “I don’t actually know whether to say ‘thanks’ or ‘sorry.’”

“Both. Either.” Charlie laughed, scooting closer to him and placing her hand over his. “I’ve put you in an unfair position, I think.”

“Nowhere I didn’t choose to be,” Preston replied, taking her hand in his and squeezing gently. “The whole ‘General’ thing only goes so far. You’re so much more than that.”

“I’m glad you think so.” She let her head fall over onto his shoulder. He tensed, muscles in his arm tightening briefly before relaxing. 

Preston held his breath for several beats before speaking. “Listen, I know that you still love your husband, and I can’t really compete with that. I don’t want to.”

“You don’t have to.”

“I know, but I thought it needed saying,” he continued, voice never losing its softness. “Because Whatever this is between us... it’s good. And he’s an important part of you. I’d really hate it for you to think, even for a minute, that it bothers me.”

“Well then I’m sure you'll love to hear what I was thinking about just before we had this conversation,” she remarked sarcastically, unable to bear the complete vulnerability she felt. She could feel her composure slipping, plummeting with each passing moment.

Preston snorted out a laugh. “Why do you think I brought it up?”

“I appreciate it. Really.”

There were few words after that, just slow, companionable quiet and watching the fire lick at the dark sky. Tomorrow things would return to their normal pace, and they’d be at each other’s backs, making the Commonwealth a better place, but she would hold onto what had transpired, cherish it, and look forward to what the future held for them. 

He wasn’t Nate, and it was awkward, and new, and fragile. Pangs of guilt still gnawed at the back of her skull that she dared to move on. But she was better when she was near to him. He was warmth and assurance that things would all be okay in the end. She wouldn’t tarnish her husband’s memory by convincing herself that he wouldn’t want her to take a new chance at happiness. 

**Author's Note:**

> Yes it is weird for me that her husband's name was Nate. Yes I am having a cross fandom crisis about it. XD


End file.
